For official use only

Tom Scott was born in Canterbury on March 6, 1965 to a young, muggle, single mother named Eloisa Scott. Growing up alone with his mother, who had to work when she could (she was very good at losing jobs), Tom learned to look after himself (and his mother, in a way), quickly enough. The relationship between Tom and Eloisa was as unpredictable as their economic situation. Eloisa was extremely protective of her son, always afraid people would come and take him away from her. She could be loving and comforting when, for instance, Tom hurt himself or had a bad dream. But at other moments, if Tom tried her patience just a little too much, she would hit him too soon, more out of an I-want-my-peace-and-quiet concern, than a concern for correcting him, or she would accuse him of never showing concern for others and being just like his father. Much as he also loved her and cared for her, Tom learned to walk on eggshells around her early.

Going to school was not a great success. It became clear very soon that Tom would never be an intellectual and would be lucky if he managed to graduate at all. He kept forgetting his lessons and just couldn’t get his letters and sums right. But there was one thing Tom was really good at: football (soccer). Tom indulged in the praise he received from his coach (whom the fatherless boy absolutely worshipped), and the physical activity suited him more than the intellectual. His happiest childhood memories are on the field.

When Tom was eleven, a Ministry official visited the small family – or attempted to, since Eloisa wouldn’t let him in the first time and it took a lot of correspondence and visits to convince Eloisa that no one was going to take Tom away from her. It took even more convincing that there really was a school of magic and that it was important that Tom would go there and develop his abilities. In the end, however, Tom’s mother agreed.

Tom was sorted into Hufflepuff. In Hogwarts, too, he proved to be no academic, although his magical abilities were decent, which gave Tom the confidence that he might in fact do better at Hogwarts. He proved very good at flying. Although he never made it onto the Quidditch team, he enjoyed the sport and this shared interest allowed Tom to make friends. Exposed to all these new experiences, Tom grew into quite a happy boy (and a fat one too with all that rich Hogwarts food). However guilty it made him feel, Tom never told his mother anything about Voldemort who was causing havoc in wizarding and muggle world alike. He knew his mother was alone and he worried about her, but Tom did not want to be taken out of this school he loved so much. He always came home for breaks, however, and during the later years, he would work during the summers, to contribute to their economic situation. During these later years, his mother and he did start getting into fights now and then – that is, Tom wasn’t quite putting up with her treatment of him anymore.

Luckily for Tom’s future perspectives, the first war ended during Tom’s sixth year. This allowed Dedanna McPadraic, the daughter of a prominent auror, to attend Hogwarts. She had been in hiding and homeschooled by her family after an attack on their family some years earlier. A fragile-looking fourteen-year-old, with pale and fair features and a sweet smile, she was to Tom the loveliest thing he had ever seen and luckily for him – or so he then thought – they started dating at the end of Tom’s sixth year. They continued dating throughout Tom’s seventh year – to the disappointment of both their families, who disapproved of the match for different reasons.Tom graduated with rather poor marks. But hey, he would never have to study again, so hurray! He started working at the ministry as janitor, and was later ‘promoted’ to security guard. He continued seeing Dedanna during Hogsmeade weekends and breaks. Meanwhile, more and more tension started to build up in the relationship with his mother. Sadly, Hogwarts had no sex-ed and at the end of her final year, Dedanna discovered she was pregnant, which made Tom the ultimate ‘Undesirable Number One’ in Dedanna’s family. But the couple stuck together against the wishes of both their families and insisted on getting married. They wed in August that year during a modest ceremony in Tinworth, Dedanna’s home town.

Dedanna’s parents offered to rent a small cottage in Tinworth. Tom did not want to live near his in-laws, but he had only just started training as a security guard and did not earn enough yet to afford anything decent. Also, his mother and he had fallen out big time just after the wedding, and he was eager to get away from Canterbury, away from his mother for good. And so, he reluctantly accepted the offer. The child, a boy, whom they named ‘Gareth’, was born on January the 8th of the next year. Although he was terrified of raising a son of his own, Tom was also proud and promised himself to give Gareth everything he had never had. However, living in Tinworth didn’t provide him with the best opportunity to bond with the boy. He was very insecure about how to handle a baby and his family-in-law was constantly visiting, making him feel watched. He ended up leaving most of the care to Dedanna and her family. He prided himself in at least being around to provide for his wife and the baby. It stung, however, not be able to rent the house, and his parents-in-law would not even let him contribute. Over time, Tom reconciled with his mother (experiencing just how challenging being a parent was and feeling left out in Tinworth had something to do with it). Also, he was starting to earn a bit better. Tom was eager to move away from his parents-in-law. After many conflicts over this proposal between the spouses, the young couple finally moved to a house in Canterbury, when Gareth was almost two. A year later, Dedanna’s brother, who was in training to be an auror, was killed, and this caused a huge conflict between Dedanna and her father. She would keep the contact with her family to a minimum from that point – much to Tom’s relief. However, conflicts between Dedanna and Tom’s mother were omnipresent, and this in turn caused conflict between Tom and Dedanna.

Tom continued to feel ambivalent towards Gareth. Although he tried to make sure the boy had all the things Tom had never had – Dedanna would blame him for spoiling him –, he sometimes couldn’t stand the child and would at times even be quite a bully – saying mean things, taking a toy away etc. (only when Dedanna wasn’t around). He tried to bond. He tried to teach Gareth football. But the sensitive and unathletic boy turned out to be a disappointment in that area – as he would in many others, later on. Tom felt that the boy was spoiled and oversensitive. However, he left most of the upbringing and discipline to Dedanna, for in this field too, his wife would criticize him if he tried to correct Gareth. Tom just focused on bringing in the money. Tom and Dedanna did not have a happy marriage. Their childish love at Hogwarts was soon but a memory they kept clinging on to. Dedanna hated Tom’s mother; she would criticize Tom for many things; the more she would nag, the more immature Tom’s responses would be; and the sex was either non-existent or bad. And yet, although they fought a lot, they never talked of divorce. Both of them were afraid of change. And then there were those happy family moments now and then. And if they weren’t together, who were they at all? Other than the troubles with his wife, and with his mother, who was also good at blaming him, Tom’s life was uneventful… seriously uneventful.

Voldemort’s return (or at least the public knowledge of it one year later), made the couple grow closer again for some time, since comfort and support became more important than arguing. One year later, when the ministry fell and Tom was called to register as a muggleborn, they received a warning from Dedanna’s father not follow the instructions and to go into hiding instead. The family (with Gareth now ten) moved to an apartment elsewhere in Canterbury which Dedanna’s father and his comrades secured with different protective spells. Just before going into hiding, Dedanna had gotten pregnant again. It was probably partly due to the stress off the situation that she miscarried in her third month. This was probably one of the few times Tom cried in his adult life. His wife was completely devastated and did not get out of bed for a week, and would have breakdowns often in the weeks that followed. Later, afraid of provoking renewed grief, Tom would discuss the topic with her again.

While in hiding, Tom and Dedanna did some behind the scenes work for the resisting forces, such as keeping track of records on their enemies’ and friends’ locations, writing articles for the underground news networks and patching up damaged supplies. It wasn’t that they were such heroes, but they knew the only way they might ever be free again was by contributing. Plus, they were dependent on the resisting forces for their sustenance now.

After Voldemort’s defeat, the family moved back to a house in their old street and after the summer, Gareth went to Hogwarts. And the couple went back into their old routine of fights, tense situations, and some moments of reconciliation. This went on for a few years without much change, until Gareth apparently hit puberty and started being more difficult. Tom still kept out of the way mostly, though growing frustrated at Dedanna’s inadequacy in dealing with Gareth’s tantrums. But something had changed in the dynamics of their family that made Tom seriously reflect about whether he had actually done a better job than his father, and about how unhappy both he and his wife were. In the end, he left his wife for a couple of months, seeking distance. In this time, he also started searching for his own father, but the man turned out to be dead, having left one son, who wanted to be left alone. During this time, there was also the attack on the Department of Mysteries. Tom was lucky enough not to be situated at the department at the time, but was still involved in securing the Ministry. The danger coming so close made him seriously question what was ultimately important in his life. Finally, seeing the fruitlessness of his own inquiries missing Dedanna, finding himself more miserable without her than he was with her, the couple got back together. They promised each other real change, made clear agreements, and for some time that filled them with great optimism.

But then there was Gareth. The now fifteen year old did not share in the joy and optimism of the couple’s reunion and refused to reply to any of the letters. That summer, all they got was a short note from Gareth saying that he was staying at a friend’s place for the summer. And when the semester started, they got complaints from the school about the boy’s behavior. But still, he would not reply to any letters and did not come home for Christmas. This utterly devastated Dedanna, and this infuriated Tom, who felt that the boy was selfish, irresponsible and above all ungrateful (something Tom really couldn’t stomach). However, he was reluctant to have the school mediate, as he was embarrassed about the situation. Also, the 2002 attack on the wizengamot, although he was not at work that day, drew away his attention for some time, since he was involved in clearing and securing the Ministry 24/7 in the weeks afterwards. But when this situation settled down, and the boy still showed no concern, Tom’s patience ran out. During the last Hogsmeade weekend before the Easter break, he went to Hogsmeade, found the boy just caught for shoplifting, gave the boy what he felt was a well-earned beating and threatened him into coming home for Easter, which the teenager did.

This proved to be the end of relative peace that had settled between Tom and Dedanna while Dedanna was so depressed. Tom had been leaving all the discipline to Dedanna up to this point, but he felt it had taken them nowhere. He now went for a zero-tolerance approach – only sixteen years too late. When Tom got violent with Gareth, all hell broke loose between him and Dedanna. Meanwhile, Gareth would only provoke more and more, and Tom would be provoked more and more easily, and admittedly, maybe Tom at times sought it out – at this point, he hated Gareth.

Tom and Dedanna kept fighting throughout the years that followed, especially when Gareth was around to add fuel. The summer after Gareth had turned of age in the wizarding world, Tom forced Gareth to get a summer job if he wanted to have a roof over his head – again the cause of a major argument between him and his wife. But with Gareth working and Tom working irregular shifts and the two men being able to avoid each other mostly, the family still managed to make it through summer – the last break they would ‘manage’.

Meanwhile, Tom’s life did not only revolve around Gareth and Dedanna. Well, it almost did, because his job was boring when no entire floors were being blown up, and apart from watching football with his best friend and colleague, Samuel (if he watched at home, he was likely to have Dedanna nagging, so he spent much of his free time there), he did not really have hobbies. But his half-brother got in touch with him, and they met up once. They are now ‘in touch’, but still awkward and distant and have not met after that one time.

Tom and Dedanna’s very poor relationship did not prove to be able to survive another one of Gareth’s breaks: During the recent Christmas break, when another fight erupted between Gareth and Dedanna on the one side and Tom on the other, Dedanna left for her parents’. Strangely, Gareth refused to come with her. Tom, who didn’t want to be alone in the house with Gareth, arranged for him to stay at Samuel’s place until the break is over – or until Dedanna would come back. Tom is convinced he will come back. She wouldn’t dare really leaving him, would she? Would she?

So here is Tom. 39 years of age, still doing the same old boring job, his social life virtually non-existent, looking after a mother who can only complain, his marriage long disintegrated, and his son a disappointment – Time for a mid-life crisis!

PERSONALITY

Tom has no personality. No seriously, even he doesn’t really know who he is, what he likes or what he stands for. Well, he likes watching football. And Quidditch. There ends the list of Tom’s hobbies. Tom mostly seeks to avoid trouble, and that’s how he gets through the day. He has several strong opinions about what the world is like, or should be like, but he will not bring it up in a conversation if you hold another view. Ultimately, it is not so important.

Those strong opinions relate to what men and women are like, that immigrants are ‘taking out jobs’, that criminals ought to be sentenced more severely, that children nowadays are not taught any responsibilities, that women ought to be looked after and treated with respect etc. But it’s not so much that he took the effort to develop an informed opinion which he will now seek to defend in all circumstances. It’s rather that once Tom has decided the world is a certain way, he won’t change his mind easily.

Tom is also not someone who generally takes initiatives. He likes to stick to what he’s used to. Admittedly, he is impulsive rather than reflective when it comes to dealing with new situations. But if he can avoid new situations altogether, he’ll go with that. Tom is not a very emotional person. He is sensitive, in a way, picking up on at least some non-verbal messages, and responding to this (again, seeking to avoid trouble). But this is mostly unconscious. When Tom’s sensitivity is turned into emotion, it will mostly express itself in the form of anger. Gareth is an expert in triggering Tom – not taking responsibility, ingratitude, among other things – Tom responds with anger. His wife will criticize him, criticize his mother, make him feel cornered – Tom responds with anger. But outside of this private sphere, you will find it hard to anger Tom, or provoke other strong emotions. Most things simply no not matter enough to him. He just wants to get through him day in peace and quiet and watch that football match in the evening.

PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION

Tom is of average height, strongly built, but not overly muscular - and there is that little belly growing, since he drinks too much beer and doesn’t work out as much as he ought to. His hair is a dark shade of brown and somewhat curly. A few hairs have turned grey. He normally shaves, but may have a bit of stubble if he's been lazy. His face is long, with a somewhat square jar, and he has a long nose. His eyes are a very dark shade of blue.